What We Mortals Can Learn from the 4-Minute Mile What We Mortals Can Learn From the 4-Minute Mile Written by Matt Frazier The experts said it couldn’t be done According to legend, experts said for years that the human body was simply not capable of a 4-minute mile. It wasn’t just dangerous; it was impossible. Further legends hold that people had tried for over a thousand years to break the barrier, even tying bulls behind them to increase the incentive to do the impossible. In the 1940’s, the mile record was pushed to 4:01, where it stood for nine years, as runners struggled with the idea that, just maybe, the experts had it right. Perhaps the human body had reached its limit. The breakthrough On May 6, 1954, Roger Bannister broke the 4-minute barrier, running the distance in 3:59.4. As part of his training, he relentlessly visualized the achievement in order to create a sense of certainty in his mind and body. Barely a year after Bannister’s accomplishment, someone else ran a mile in under 4 minutes. Then some more runners did.

Now, it’s almost routine. Even strong high-schoolers today run 4-minute miles. [Note: this used to say “24 people broke the 4-minute mark within a year of Bannister. This is wrong; see the comments.] What does this mean for us? I don’t know about you, but for me, a 4-minute mile is probably not in the cards. (5 minutes? Maybe one day.) That’s not the point. The point is this: It took a sense of extreme certainty for Roger Bannister to do what was considered un-doable. He alone was able to create that certainty in himself without seeing any proof that it could be done. But once he crashed through that barrier, the rest of the world saw that it was possible, and the previous record that had stood for nine years was broken routinely. New Agers call it the Law of Attraction, scientists call it the RAS I love this story. I don’t know how much of it is true; I sense that some of the details have become overblown in an effort to dramatize. Either way, it doesn’t matter. I’ve witnessed firsthand what a little certainty can do.

When you become certain of something, when every part of your makeup believes it because you focus on it every single day, something “magical” happens. Not New Age magical, but science magical. We have a system in our bodies called the reticular activating system (RAS) that helps our brains decide what information to focus on and what to delete. When you have a clearly-defined purpose, a mission, and when you live every moment in a state of certainty that you’ll achieve it, you influence what your RAS filters out and what lights it up. As a result, you pay special attention things that help you achieve what you’re after, things you otherwise would have never noticed. When I was trying to qualify for Boston , I wrote a post about how certain I had been that I’d do it, as documented by a grad-school application letter I wrote. There was no reason for this certainty. But I found it somewhere in myself, and it’s for that reason alone that I eventually did qualify last year. (You’ve seen the new page about all my best BQ posts , right?) And now, it’s that way with ultramarathons.

Before I knew that people even ran 100-milers, someone told me that a friend of mine was running them. I didn’t believe it; I thought something had gotten garbled in the chain of communication. But I found an ultra group and started training with them, guys and girls who do 50’s and 100’s all the time. They’re not superhuman; they’re runners like me. Some faster, some slower. But now I’m certain. Later this year I’ll run a 50-miler (the JFK 50-miler is a likely candidate), and I’ll run a 100 after that. Of this I’m certain. Where could you use a little certainty? What would it take, short of proof, to make you believe? This post is part of a series on motivation for running . Check out the rest!

Roger Bannister breaks four-minutes mile - May 06, 1954 - HISTORY.com Roger Bannister breaks four-minutes mile Share this: Roger Bannister breaks four-minutes mile Author Roger Bannister breaks four-minutes mile URL Publisher A+E Networks On this day in 1954, at the Iffley Road Track in Oxford, England, medical student Roger Bannister becomes the first person in recorded history to run the mile in under four minutes. Roger Bannister was born in Middlesex on March 23, 1929. His parents couldn’t afford to send him to school, so he ran his way in: Bannister won a track scholarship to Oxford, where he studied medicine and was a running sensation. He caused a furor in England when he declined to run the 1500 meters in the 1948 London Olympics so he could concentrate on his medical studies. He did run in the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki, but finished fourth. Again, the British press scorned him. He then resolved to break track and field’s most famous barrier, the four-minute mile, a feat many believed to be impossible.

Bannister had limited time to train, as he was enrolled at St. Mary’s Hospital Medical School. He would run 30 minutes most days, focusing the rest of his time on his study of neurology. On May 6, 1954, Bannister was running for the Amateur Athletic Association in Oxford against runners from the university in their annual match. He ran with two friends, who paced him, and then sprinted the last 200 yards, for a record time of 3:59.4. Later that month, Australian John Landy broke Bannister’s record by less than a second. The two were then made out to be rivals. In August, Bannister and Landy met face-to-face at the British Empire Games in Vancouver, British Columbia, where 35,000 spectators watched what was billed as the “mile of the century.” Landy led Bannister the entire race, but Bannister out-sprinted Landy down the straightaway to win by five yards and less than a second, 3:58.8 to 3:59.6. Their two times were the third and fourth recorded miles run in under four minutes in history.

Bannister finished his medical degree and became a practicing neurologist and neuroscience researcher. Knighted in 1975, Sir Roger Bannister served as director of the National Hospital for Nervous Diseases in London. Long after his career as a runner had ended, in an interview with Bill Heine of BBC’s Radio Oxford, Bannister called running a “powerful source of self expression” and said of his talent on the track, “I believe that as I grew up through adolescence, this capacity to run without pain or discomfort became part of me, and it found its expression in running in cross country races, running with friends, for the sheer enjoyment running across the countryside. Running, not walking, and, eventually this became a track event with more and more people watching and people concerned with stopwatches.” Related Videos Roger Bannister Breaks the 4-minute Mile Barrier Roger Bannister Breaks the 4-minute Mile Barrier On May 6, 1954, a British medical student named Roger Bannister ran a mile around a track in less than 4 minutes. It was one of the 20th Century's defining athletic achievements.

Runners had been running consistently faster as generations went by and athletes got more serious and focused and disciplined. The one-mile race was considered one of the marquee distances. The four-minute time was considered an untouchable barrier. It also became a target. Roger Bannister, the first man to run a mile in less than 4 minutes, was a talented runner who brought to his athletic pursuit a scientific approach honed in his medical student training. Bannister had enjoyed running since he was a boy. He was also very fast. At school, he enjoyed success in cross country, winning the school meet three straight years, when he was 12–14. He kept running, even when attending Oxford University to study medicine. The first hint that he had special talent came when in 1947, when he was running as the pacer for the Oxford team in a one-mile race against arch-rival Cambridge. He didn't stop running, though, as pacers are meant to do but kept running and won the race, by 20 yards. His time was 4:18.7. He soon was entering other races, in the U.K. and in other countries.

In 1949, he won a couple of races in the U.S., finishing in 4:11. The following year, he ran a final-lap time of 57.5, suggesting that he could go under 4 minutes if he could hold that pace for four laps around a track. (The fact that the 57.5 came in the last lap, after he had already run three, was amazing to those who saw it and read about it afterward.) In 1951, in the U.S. for the Penn Relays, Bannister won going away with a time 4:08.3. Again, his last lap was his fastest, a 56.7. After a fourth-place finish in the 1500 meters at the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki, Bannister renewed his drive to break 4 minutes. He did this, of course, in between his studies. He was still in medical school, and each year was more demanding than the last. In late 1953 and early 1954, he was so busy at school that he found little time for running.

Hearing that the Australian runner John Landy had announced his intention to break 4 minutes, Bannister redoubled his efforts. Bannister broke the 4-minute barrier on May 6, 1954, on the Iffley Road track in Oxford. Bannister at the time was running for the Amateur Athletic Association, and it was a carefully choreographed assault, with pacemakers Chris Brasher and Chris Chataway leading the way. The weather wasn't ideal: A 15mph crosswind made things a bit difficult in the early going. But Bannister followed his two pacers around the track for all four laps, at a very high speed, and then took the lead himself with 200 yards to go. When he broke the tape, the clock read 3:59.4. Bannister was instantly famous and will forever be known as the first man to break the 4-minute barrier. His race was called the "Miracle Mile." It was the lead story in Sports Illustrated. Landy and others soon broke 4 minutes as well, and the tile for the one-mile race has continued to be lowered in the years since.

Meanwhile, Bannister completed his medical training and became a neurologist, a profession he still holds. He wrote a book about his running, called The Four Minute Mile. He was knighted in 1975. Custom Search Roger Bannister turns clock back 60 years and still feels the thrill | Sport | The Guardian The running blog Roger Bannister turns clock back 60 years and still feels the thrill Junior doctor who broke four-minute mile barrier on famous day in Oxford recalls cocktail of doubt, anger, fear, exhilaration Roger Bannister breaking the world mile record and the four-minute barrier at Iffley Road Track in Oxford on 6 May 1954.

Photograph: Getty Images The running blog Roger Bannister turns clock back 60 years and still feels the thrill Junior doctor who broke four-minute mile barrier on famous day in Oxford recalls cocktail of doubt, anger, fear, exhilaration Monday 5 May 2014 18.00 EDT First published on Monday 5 May 2014 18.00 EDT Share on Messenger Close Sixty years ago on Tuesday Roger Bannister collapsed into a swarm of men wearing stiff macs and bowler hats, his body feeling "like an exploding flashbulb" as he fell. Then came the words that revived him quicker than any pharmaceutical pick-me-up. "Result of event eight: one mile. First, RG Bannister of Exeter and Merton colleges, in a time which, subject to ratification, is a new track record, British record, European record, Commonwealth record and world record – Three minutes and …" The rest of the sentence was drowned by cheers. Bannister, a 25-year-old medical student, had become the first to break through the four-minute barrier.

Bannister does not remember the last time he watched the Pathe News footage of him accelerating towards history with a time of 3min 59.4sec. But really, he tells the Guardian, there is no need. Why recall in black and white what your mind's eye replays on demand in glorious technicolour? "They tell me more people have climbed Everest than have run a four-minute mile," he chuckles, before he is taken back to Thursday 6 May 1954, a day when the weather flip-flopped between squall and sunshine, bluster and gales. For much of it Bannister worried that the 25mph winds would make going under four minutes impossible. He nearly didn't run at all. Breakfast was porridge at his Earl's Court flat, lunch a ham and cheese salad at a friend's in Oxford. In between he spent the morning at hospital, where he sharpened his spikes on a grindstone in a laboratory, before catching the train to Oxford. "I got to the track at 4.30pm but didn't decide to race until about half an hour before it was due to start at 6pm," he says.

"My pacemakers Chris Brasher and Chris Chataway were getting a little impatient. They were saying: 'Make up your mind!' But it was I who had to do it. I was very concerned about the weather but when the wind dropped it proved just possible." Bannister also knew that the Australian runner John Landy, who had gone under 4min 02sec for the mile four times, was heading to Finland with the aim of breaking four minutes. The attempt was on. He talks through the race fluently but dispassionately; the best bits have to be teased out of him. The anger he felt after a false start by his first pacemaker Chris Brasher. Then feeling so full of energy on the first lap that he was shouting: "Faster!" at Brasher. And then the fear at the end of the 62.4sec third lap when the record appeared to be slipping away. "I heard the lap times as they went by," he says. "The first was 58. The half-mile 1.58.

But the three-quarters was three minutes and one second so I knew I had to produce a last lap of under 59." Did you worry at the end of that third lap? "Oh yes! And I was also unsure whether I should start my finish immediately or wait another 150 yards and overtake Chataway in the back straight. I decided I would stay a bit longer and then went. There was plenty of adrenaline then, I can assure you!" He had intended to keep his record attempt quiet. However his friend Norris McWhirter – later, appropriately, a presenter of Record Breakers – alerted the press. The BBC sent a lone cameraman, who captured the race stood on top of his van parked in the centre of the track. The footage was quickly sent back to London where it would be shown on that evening's Sportsview. Bannister's performance was more remarkable still given his lack of training. He would skip his gynaecology lectures, enabling him to run for 45 minutes at lunchtime, and did only 35 miles a week. Most modern club runners would exceed that. However only 1,338 people have ever broken four minutes for the mile.

It is also worth noting the effects of the cinder track, which is around one to one-and-a-half seconds a lap slower than modern surfaces. What Bannister produced that day was very special. However his record lasted just six weeks before Landy lowered it by more than a second. But later in 1954, when the pair met at the Empire Games in Vancouver, Bannister emerged triumphant after an epic contest – later called, with complete justification, the Miracle Mile – coming from 15 yards down with a surprise sprint off the last bend. As Bannister relates in his autobiography, Twin Tracks, he retired from athletics later that year and went on to become a neurologist as well as the first chairman of the Sports Council. Even now, at 85, he remains sharp and jolly, despite suffering from Parkinson's. "I'm slow and need help walking but I'm taking it with a proper sense of perspective," he adds. "At 85 I have had many opportunities. I also have many friends and a very supportive family.

These are all things I bless myself for." BBC ON THIS DAY | 6 | 1954: Bannister breaks four-minute mile About This Site | Text Only 1954: Bannister breaks four-minute mile Roger Bannister, a 25-year-old British medical student, has become the first man to run a mile in less than four minutes. His time was 3mins 59.4 seconds, achieved at the Iffley Road track in Oxford and watched by about 3,000 spectators. Bannister, once president of the Oxford club, was running for the Amateur Athletic Association against his old university during their annual match. The race was carefully planned and he was aided by two pacemakers, Chris Brasher and Chris Chataway. Brasher took the lead as the first pacemaker, Bannister slotted in behind, with Chataway in third place. When Brasher began to feel the strain, Bannister signalled for Chataway to take over. Just over 200 yards from the finish, Bannister took the lead with a final burst of energy.

He sprinted to the line in record time and fell exhausted into the arms of a friend, the Rev Nicholas Stacey. Pandemonium broke out when spectators heard news that Bannister had officially beaten the four-minute mile. He had prepared for the race the previous week at Paddington Green in London in high winds. The weather at Iffley Road was not ideal for record-breaking - a 15mph crosswind with gusts of up to 25mph meant that Bannister nearly called off the attempt. Bannister has beaten his main rival to the record - Australian athlete John Landy. Both had run quite close to the time but the magic number four had proved elusive until now. Happy Birthday, Roger Bannister, First Runner to Break the Four-Minute Mile Bannister breaking the four-minute mile. Happy Birthday, Roger Bannister, First Runner to Break the Four-Minute Mile March 23, 2011 by findingDulcinea Staff In 1954, British medical student Roger Bannister became the first man to break the four-minute mile barrier, earning him international admiration and Sports Illustrated's first Sportsman of the Year award.

When asked how he achieved his record-breaking feat, he replied, “It’s the ability to take more out of yourself than you've got.” Roger Bannister’s Early Days Roger Bannister was born March 23, 1929 , in Harrow, England, to working-class parents. Bannister excelled in the classroom and aspired to attend college and study medicine. He earned an academic scholarship to Oxford University, where he became a nationally recognized runner in the mile and 1500 meters. Though he likely could have qualified for the 1948 London Olympics, he chose instead to focus on his medical training and studies. Sports Illustrated: 1954 & Its Sportsman: Roger Bannister Bannister had hoped to win a gold medal in the 1952 Summer Olympics in Helsinki. However, he tired toward the end of the 1500 meters and finished fourth to great disappointment and denigration from the British press. The BBC called it a “watershed moment”; Bannister, who planned to retire from running before the next Olympics, became determined to break the four-minute barrier and attain the fame that eluded him in Helsinki.

“I thought: Well, I can't leave on this sour note , feeling failure, disappointment, letting people down—letting the country down,” Bannister recalled in a 2004 interview. Bannister was a self-taught runner who used his medical knowledge to closely monitor his pulse rate, oxygen intake and diet. In November 1951, with his personal best at 4:02, he hired Austrian trainer Franz Stampf, who introduced Bannister to new training methods and taught him to better pace himself. On May 6, 1954, at the Oxford v. British A.A.A. race, Bannister was prepared to break the four-minute barrier . He nearly postponed the barrier-breaking attempt on that rainy, windy day, but decided to go ahead. According to Bannister’s plan, one teammate set a fast early pace, while a second teammate raced to the lead in the second half of the race. “Some 300 yards from the finish. Bannister began pouring it on,” wrote Time, “lengthening his stride for his famed finishing kick, his head rolled back, his neck painfully arched.

He tore the tape and collapsed unconscious into the arms of Trainer Stampfl.” Watch the BBC’s coverage of Bannister’s four-minute mile . The track announcer, Norris McWhirter, announced the time, which began with “three minutes.” Time wrote, “At that point, the 1,500 track fans in the stands broke into such an uproar that the rest of the announcement was lost: ‘Three minutes, fifty-nine and four-tenths seconds.’” Bannister’s record stood for less than a month, beaten by Australian runner John Landy. Bannister beat Landy in that summer’s British Empire Games, running a 3:58.8 mile. He would go on to win the European championships in the 1500 meters and be named Sports Illustrated’s Sportsman of the Year in 1954 , the first year the honor was given. “ Bannister was about the last of his breed —the athlete on the side,” wrote Sports Illustrated’s Frank Deford in 2004. “Just as inventions are no longer made in garages, so human beings don't break records in their spare time anymore.

… But somehow … it seemed right that the final, great challenge fell to one young man, who did it all by himself, the same as his forefathers. In a way, Roger Bannister was the last hero in sport.” Limiting Beliefs, Roger Bannister and the 4-Minute Mile Limiting Beliefs, Roger Bannister and the 4-Minute Mile May 3, 2012 By Elana 6 Comments “The man who can drive himself further when the effort gets painful is the man who will win.” –Roger Bannister On May 6, 1954, Roger Bannister became the first person to run a sub-4 minute mile. Prior to this monumental event, the 4-minute mile barrier had developed such a mystique surrounding it that some considered it a physical impossibility. But the next month the barrier was again shattered by John Landy, and in the following few years broken by almost a dozen more runners. Now, there are almost 900 men who have run a sub-4 minute mile, including a former high school student and a 40+ year-old man.

It’s true that when Roger Bannister crossed the finish line, the sport was poised for this record to be broken. Over the past century, advancements in training technique, equipment and track surfaces have continuously whittled away at race times. But what led this one man to break the record when he did, when many others had tried and failed? Our beliefs determine how high we set our sights Roger Bannister believed he could run a sub-4 minute mile, and so aimed for this goal with all the direction and focus he could muster. After a disappointing finish in the 1952 Olympics, Bannister made an important decision: that he wanted to be the first man to run a mile under four minutes. (Remember: failures often lead to new realizations that lead to the surmounting of new challenges.) Ambitious beliefs lead to ambitious goals. Limiting beliefs lead to impotent goals. You will rarely accomplish more that what you set out to, and can’t hit the target if you’re not aiming for it. Positive thinking isn’t enough, but it creates a mindset that allows the intersection of superior planning and execution When you believe something is possible, you tend to plan for it.

After Roger Bannister made the decision to pursue the 4-minute mile, he changed his training regimen, training more frequently and with harder intervals. He trained with the single-minded intention of beating this record. His performance on May 6, 1954 was not an accident of fate. It was the intersection of belief, motivation, planning, execution and a little bit of luck. Simply wishing on a star will not make your goal a reality. But raising your standard and believing you can accomplish something is the first step. With belief comes visualization, and with visualization comes planning, and with planning comes execution. And with a deep, soul-rocking belief in your ability to accomplish a goal comes the motivation and discipline to see through your plan even when the going gets tough. *** First four-minute mile - May 06, 1954 - HISTORY.com Publisher A+E Networks In Oxford, England, 25-year-old medical student Roger Bannister cracks track and field’s most notorious barrier: the four-minute mile. Bannister, who was running for the Amateur Athletic Association against his alma mater, Oxford University, won the mile race with a time of 3 minutes and 59.4 seconds.

For years, so many athletes had tried and failed to run a mile in less than four minutes that people made it out to be a physical impossibility. The world record for a mile was 4 minutes and 1.3 seconds, set by Gunder Hagg of Sweden in 1945. Despite, or perhaps because of, the psychological mystique surrounding the four-minute barrier, several runners in the early 1950s dedicated themselves to being the first to cross into the three-minute zone. Roger Bannister, born in Harrow, England, in 1929, was a top mile-runner while a student at the University of Oxford and at St. Mary’s Hospital Medical School in London. In 1951 and 1953, he won British championships in the mile run. As he prepared himself for his first competitive race of the 1954 season, Bannister researched the mechanics of running and trained using new scientific methods he developed. On May 6, 1954, he came to the Iffley Road track in Oxford for the annual match between the Amateur Athletic Association and Oxford University. Conditions were far from ideal; it had been windy and raining.

A considerable crosswind was blowing across the track as the mile race was set to begin. At 6 p.m., the starting gun was fired. In a carefully planned race, Bannister was aided by Chris Brasher, a former Cambridge runner who acted as a pacemaker. For the first half-mile, Brasher led the field, with Bannister close behind, and then another runner took up the lead and reached the three-quarter-mile mark in 3 minutes 0.4 seconds, with Bannister at 3 minutes 0.7 seconds. Bannister took the lead with about 350 yards to go and passed an unofficial timekeeper at the 1,500-meter mark in 3 minutes 43 seconds, thus equaling the world’s record for that distance. Thereafter, Bannister threw in all his reserves and broke the tape in 3 minutes 59.4 seconds. As soon as the first part of his score was announced–“three minutes…”–the crowd erupted in pandemonium. Bannister went on to win British and Empire championships in the mile run, and the European title in the 1,500-meter event in 1954.

At the end of the year, Bannister retired from athletic competition to pursue his medical career full time and in 1955 recounted his experiences in the book The Four Minute Mile. He later earned a medical degree from Oxford and became a neurologist. In 1975, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II. His world record in the mile did not stand long, and the record continued to be lowered with increasingly controlled climatic and surface conditions, more accurate timing devices, and improvements in training and running techniques. A “sub-four” is still a notable time, but top international runners now routinely accomplish the feat. Because a mile is not a metric measurement, it is not a regular track event nor featured in the Olympics. It continues, however, to be run by many top runners as a glamour event.

Related Videos Sir Roger Bannister: I'd choose Olympic gold over breaking the four-minute mile barrier | Radio Times Twitter Sir Roger Bannister: I'd choose Olympic gold over breaking the four-minute mile barrier The 83-year-old reveals how he saved the British Olympic team from disaster at the London 1948 Opening Ceremony Comments Patrick Foster 3:02 PM, 09 August 2012 You were 19 when the Games last came to London, in 1948, but you didn’t compete. Why not? There was a feeling at the time that if runners exposed themselves to too much competition early on in their careers, they would never reach their potential. Although that may or may not be true, I decided to save myself for the 1952 Olympics. What did you do instead? I got a job as the assistant to the chef de mission for the Olympics, and I actually made a small contribution to the Opening Ceremony. The teams were preparing to parade around the stadium and for some reason it became clear that there was no Union Jack for our team. There was absolute panic. The chef de mission ordered me to find a flag. I knew he had a spare one in his car.

Fortunately I had a jeep with an Army sergeant as a driver. First of all we had to find the car in the car park. Then when we located it we had no key, and I had to smash the window with a brick. A policeman came over, I think to arrest me, and this sergeant had to tell him what I was doing. Next we had to rush back to the stadium. The crowd was so dense, I had to get out of the jeep and run. I don’t know how I made it, but I did. So, four years later in 1952 you competed – what happened? The organisers decided that instead of having a heat, then a day’s rest, then the semi-final and final, they would have all three on consecutive days. I hadn’t expected it and so I didn’t train as hard as the other European runners, especially as I was a medical student at the time. I came fourth in the 1500m and, even though I broke the British record, such was my disappointment that I weighed up whether to retire, which I would have done had I won the Olympic gold. But I decided I would go on for another two years until I qualified as a doctor.

In 1954 there would be both the European Championships and the Empire & Commonwealth Games, and I thought they would represent a respectable equivalent to the Olympics. By 1953, John Landy, the Australian, had run 4.02 in the mile, so it became clear to me that in order to be sure of beating Landy in the Empire Games I would have to be sure of beating the four-minute mark. I didn’t manage it in 1953, but in 1954 I did it. Looking back, would you have preferred to get an Olympic gold or break the four-minute barrier? I’d prefer the gold. To get a gold you have to win in a race in which you have to protect yourself from being boxed in and all the strategy that goes with middle-distance running. It’s the test of whether you can do it under race conditions. Did you apply for tickets to this year’s Games? I didn’t have to apply as there is a special process for Olympians. I received tickets for the opening ceremony! And for the 1500m final. What do you think the limits will be for mile runners?

In 1954, when asked the same question, I said I thought that 3.30 would be at the limit of capacity for humans with our heart and lung system. It’s at 3.43 now [set by Morocco’s Hicham El Guerrouj]. But whenever you can find one runner to do a time, you’ll find someone who can do it two seconds faster. It is a stretch, but I think 3.30 will be reached, and by an East African runner. They hold almost every record from the 800m up to the marathon. Like this? Share it. Four-minute mile: How Daily Express reported Roger Bannister's victory | History | News | Daily Express 00:00, Fri, Sep 26, 2014 The four-mile run happened over 60 years ago [PA/EXPRESS] It was the behaviour of a Cross of St George flag flying on the steeple of St John's Church near the Iffley Road track in Oxford on Thursday May 6 1954 that persuaded the 25-year-old medical student to change his mind.

At 5.30pm on the appointed day it was blowing horizontal in a stiff wind but when Bannister came out of his dressing room 25 minutes later to see if conditions had improved he could see from a change in its flutter that the wind had dropped a little. "Right, I'll try it," he said. A modern-day athlete attempting to break a world record would do so only after weeks of training at altitude fuelled by a diet carefully prepared by a sports scientist, wearing running shoes fitted with lightweight ceramic spikes and on an all-weather synthetic track that married traction and shock absorption. This being the amateur era, Bannister had spent the previous three weeks sitting his medical exams and on the morning of the attempt only took a train to Oxford after completing his rounds at St Mary's Paddington. After joining friends for a ham salad lunch he changed into leather running shoes with spikes he sharpened himself on a grindstone, and prepared to make his record-breaking bid on a crunchy, uneven, cinder track. At 6pm precisely he lined with his pacemakers Chris Chataway and Chris Brasher in front of an estimated 3,000 spectators.

How the Daily Express reported it [EXPRESS] He ran the lap in 58.9 seconds - and ran straight into the almanacs of glory Daily Express report The Daily Express's front-page report described is as "an utterly English scene": "No tension. "A couple of thousand people thinly lining the track. "Straw-hatted boys lounging under golf umbrellas. "And then: First lap - 57.5 secs. Second lap - 1 minute 58.2 seconds. "Third lap - 3 minutes 0.5 secs. Could he do it? "The fourth lap in 59.5 seconds? "He didn't know then how fast he was running. "But he ran the lap in 58.9 seconds - and ran straight into the almanacs of glory." The story went on: "He finished fighting for breath, his head rolling with fatigue - and as he broke the tape he fell headlong into waiting arms.

"He was unconscious and so the last man at the track to realise his success." In an interview later, he said: "I have never felt so good in all my life and I am so glad it took an Englishman to do this thing." Roger Bannister on the day that he changed history [AP] He celebrated a feat that the newspaper compared to the first breaking of the sound barrier by a jet plane with a pint of shandy at Vincent's Club in Oxford before heading for London to meet the press. He then repaired to a club above the Royal Court theatre on London's exclusive Sloane Square where he enjoyed "a four-minute steak and several glasses of champagne".

The Daily Express also noted: "He was joined at the table by a tall fair girl in an off-the-shoulder green gown." At 12.50am, he told the paper's reporter: "I feel like dancing until dawn and I may yet do." Six weeks later the Australian runner John Landy beat Bannister's time of 3 minutes 59.4 seconds by 1.5 seconds at a race meeting in Finland but in the world of record-breaking there are no prizes for coming second and it is the Brit who will be remembered by posterity for running the "miracle mile". At the end of 1954, Bannister retired from competitive running to pursue his medical studies full-time and later became a consultant neurologist. He had to stop running to keep fit after his ankle was crushed in a car accident in 1975 but resumed "shuffling" in 2008 after discovering a low impact Kenyan shoe made out of a section of car tyre. Now 85, and a knight of the realm, he lives in Oxford, the site of his greatest triumph.

Meanwhile, the current fastest mile record is held by Hicham El Guerrouj of Morocco, who ran a time of 3 minutes 43.13 seconds in 1999. Sir Roger Bannister in April 2014 [REX] WHAT ELSE HAPPENED IN 1954? February 18: The Church of Scientology is founded in California based on the teachings of a science fiction writer called L Ron Hubbard, who claimed that an extraterrestial being called Xenu brought billions of people to Earth in spaceships. Despite its eccentric teachings, Scientology has since attracted many high-profile adherents in Hollywood including Tom Cruise and John Travolta. July 21: The Indo-China war ends after eight years and 300,000 deaths with the division of Vietnam. The communist regime of Ho Chi Minh is to run North Vietnam from its capital Hanoi and the nationalist forces under prime minister Ngo Dinh Diem will rule the south from Saigon. In addition the communists promise to recognize Laos and Cambodia as independent countries.

Washington was always unhappy with the French-led decision to agree to the break up of the country and, after China and the Soviet Union backed communist rebels known as the Viet Cong in South Vietnam in the mid-60s, the US intervened and sparked the Vietnam War which dragged on till 1975 costing the lives of 58,000 American soldiers. October 28: The Nobel Prize for Literature is awarded to Ernest Hemingway "for his mastery of the art of narrative, most recently demonstrated in The Old Man and the Sea, and for the influence that he has exerted on contemporary style". December 2: The American Republican senator Joe McCarthy whose witch-hunt of alleged communists in American public life gave rise to the term McCarthyism, is censured by the Senate for conduct unbecoming to a senator. The 67-22 vote brought to an end McCarthy's persecution of prominent figures in government and Hollywood on the basis of all too often unsubstantiated accusations. Related articles

Question: In what year did Roger Bannister break the 4 minute mile barrier?
Answer: 1954